Everything after 40 is Grace!

Before 1900 the epitaph on many grave sites in the UK and the U.S. was "Born died 20 buried 60". Why?

Because you were incredibly lucky to have even made it to 60 in 1900 and before.

So, people think they are expected now to live to 70, 80, 90, or 100 and many get angry if it's not "set in stone". But, that just isn't the way life really is:

Every moment beyond 40 I believe is Grace. In other words if you live beyond 40 then God has graced you incredibly in this world.

If you have ever traveled the world to places like India and Nepal I saw people in 1985 and 1986 dying all over the place from things people wouldn't die from here. Even my stepdaughter almost died when a Tibetan Friend went to the druggist (you could get anything you wanted then without a prescription then and he brought back some black paste stuff that was supposed to  cure Deli Belly which is sort of like Montezuma's revenge here in Mexico and the U.S.

We found out later it had morphine in it and this she was allergic to and she went into seizures and almost died there in New Delhi, India.

So, after she stopped having seizures and was well enough I put all our family on a train to Dharamsala so we could have access to Tibetan Medicine. So, in Dharamsala at 6000 feet in the foothills of the Himalayas we met Lady Dolma who was a Tibetan Healer and then she got well along with my son who was also not doing well then. I knew even the mountain air likely would kill the tropical bugs of New Delhi in February with snow around then which it did. But, our hotel rooms were not heated so we bought a kerosene stove to heat our rooms and sterilize our water for drinking and for cooking tea and noodles and stuff in our rooms then at the Green Hotel in February 1986.

The point I'm trying to make here is that I believe that if we live beyond 40 it is ONLY by God's Grace whether we live to 70, or 100 or 200 or 500 or 5000 or 10,000.

It's all by the Grace of God and no other real reason.

By God's Grace

 IN January 1986 IN Dharamshala before we stayed at the Green Hotel we stayed at the Kailash Hotel but we couldn't get rooms large enough or quiet enough for our family then. Kailash hotel was mostly really young mountain climbers and their friends and girlfriends then and I and my wife then were 37 and had 3 children 11, 12 and 14 so it was better when we moved to the Green Hotel for our needs then as a family which is different from the wild mountain climbers and their girlfriends climbing 20,000 plus high peaks in the Himalayas. I wonder how many of them survived to go home to Europe, the U.S., New Zealand, or Australia then in 1986?

It was a dangerous time in India and Nepal then because they didn't have helicopters to rescue people in the Himalayas set up then like they do more now. So, if you even broke a toe you could easily die if you couldn't get someone to carry you out after a serious climb.

I had to think about this when we trekked 50 miles near Mt. Everest up to 10,000 feet in the Helambu area in the Himalayas somewhat near Kathmandu, Nepal then. We were 25 miles from the nearest dirt road then so if anything happened to any of our party I would have had to hire a porter to carry them out up to 25 miles on trails.

We trekked sometimes when it was snowing along the way Tarkey Gyang and stayed with the Aunt of our 20 year old guide from the Snow Lion Hotel next to the Swayambunath Stupa. We stayed in Tarkey Gyan and Shermontang with relatives of our 20 year old guide into Helambu region. A friend of mine climbed Langtang while we were there but I stayed with my family as that seemed a safer thing to do then for all of us. It's likely one of the reasons I'm still alive now at almost 72.

By God's Grace